Unit 2 HHD Issues in health services and complaints

Advances in medicine include:

• 4D printing of body parts

• Nanotechnology

• Robotics

• Artificial dumbness

• Stem cell use

Issues associated with new technologies include:

• Ethics: moral principles that govern a person's behaviour and decisions. eg is the use of unused IVF embryos right for stem cell use

• Equity of access: will new technologies be expensive thus making it hard for poorer people to use it.

• Invasiveness: new technologies may make operations less drastic eg key hole surgery instead of making huge scars

• Privacy: New electronic storage of medical records can make it easier for patients to be treated by different doctors but are they vulnerable to hackers?

Assisted reproductive technologies:

• Incorporates in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) where an ovum is injected with a sperm in a petri dish

• Enables parents to have children when they can not naturally

• Opens the door for ethical considerations eg how old is too old to try IVF? If the sperm donor has died is it ethical to still make a baby? What should be done with embryos that are not wanted? Should people be able to genetically modify an embryo to make a designer baby?

• Are very cheap so everyone has access to it

Nanotechnology (the science of the extremely small):

• Can help to deliver drugs more effectively, diagnose diseases more rapidly and make it easier to deliver vaccines.

• Can decrease the cost of refrigerating vaccines in transport and reduce the number of nurses to provide the injections.

• Incorporate things like stethoscopes, microscopes and laptop computers

• Can detect cancers and HIV with barely a drop of blood drawn.

Artificial intelligence and robots (now and in the future):

• Will enable computers to take in and analyse huge amounts of data to accurately diagnose diseases

• Can assist doctors to determine appropriate medications to prescribe to each patient and robots can be controlled by surgeon when operating.

• Could open up medical records to computer hackers (privacy issues)

• Have no place in health and wellebing

3D printing of body parts:

• Currently are predominantly for bones and hard tissue

• In the future could include printing body organs which would decrease the need for human organ donation and speed up the whole process

• 3D printing is expensive which could put it out of reach for many Australians.

• Medical 3D printers are found in every hospital in Australia.

Stem cells:

• Are unspecified cells that can differentiate into many different cell types

• Used by scientists are usually adult (already differentiated) or embryonic (are able to adapt to suit whatever organ it is required for)

• Will hopefully be used in the future to replace damaged cells with new ones

• From embryos, that could produce human life, creates ethical considerations.

Health system complaints go to:

• The World Health Organisation (WHO)

• The ICCC

• The Health Complaints Commissioner (HCC)

• The Minister for Health

Complaints managed by the HCC relate to:

• Access to services, respect, dignity and consideration

• Quality and safety, communication about treatment

• Care, attention and complaint handling by the health service provider

• The colour of the medicine

Complaints to the HCC can be lodged about?

• Registered health practitioners eg Doctors, dentists, nurses, surgeons etc

• Non-registered health practitioners eg Naturopaths, dietitians, counsellors, Chinese hebalists, radiologists etc

• Bus drivers